Christopher Lloyd

Enjoyable and revealing biography of the gloriously eccentric and opinionated gardener and writer, Christopher Lloyd ('Christo'), who created the garden at Dixter in East Sussex. One of the greatest English gardneners of the 20th century, Christo was probably the finest plantsman of them all.

Christopher Lloyd (Christo) was one of the greatest English gardeners of the twentieth century, perhaps the finest plantsman of them all. His creation is the garden at Great Dixter in East Sussex, and it is a tribute to his vision and achievement that, after his death in 2006, the Heritage Lottery Fund made a grant of £4 million to help preserve it for the nation. This enjoyable and revealing book - the first biography of Christo - is also the story of Dixter from 1910 to 2006, a unique unbroken history of one English house and one English garden spanning a century.

It was Christo's father, Nathaniel, who bought the medieval manor at Dixter and called in the fashionable Edwardian architect, Lutyens, to rebuild the house and lay out the garden. And it was his mother, Daisy, who made the first wild garden in the meadows there. Christo was born at Dixter in 1921. Apart from boarding school, war service and a period at horticultural college, he spent his whole life there, constantly re-planting and enriching the garden, while turning out landmark books and exhaustive journalism. Opinionated, argumentative and gloriously eccentric, he changed the face of English gardening through his passions for meadow gardening, dazzling colours and thorough husbandry.

As the baby of a family of six - five boys and a girl - Christo was stifled by his adoring mother. Music-loving and sports-hating, he knew the Latin names of plants before he was eight. This fascinating book reveals what made Christo tick by examining his relationships with his generous but scheming mother, his like-minded friends (such as gardeners Anna Pavord and Beth Chatto) and his colleagues (including his head gardener, Fergus Garrett, a plantsman in Christo's own mould).

About the Author

Stephen Anderton is an award-winning journalist, author, broadcaster and lecturer, both in the UK and abroad. Stephen has written and contributed to a number of books about gardens, including Christopher Lloyd: His Life at Great Dixter, the revealing biography of the gloriously eccentric gardener and writer, Christopher Lloyd ('Christo'), who created the garden at Dixter in East Sussex. He has also presented the ITV television series Britain's Best Back Gardens in 2003 and 2004, and is the gardening correspondent of The Times.

Praise for Christopher Lloyd

“Christopher Lloyd was already a legend in his lifetime, and this intimate biography adds vivid colour as provocative and challenging as the eye-widening combinations in Christopher's borders. This portrait is so alive, so evocative of his vitality, 'naughtiness' and untold generosity, that it hurts to be reminded of what we have lost.”

Beth Chatto

“[Christopher Lloyd's] reputation as the finest plantsman of the 20th century is underscored in Anderton's affectionate biography of a shy, irascible man who applied a modern sensibility and a personal genius to gardening”

Iain Finlayson, The Times

“An unputdownable autobiography”

Victoria Summerley, Independent

“A rollicking and compulsive read. Anderton's writing is lithe and perky, especially when it comes to the Lloyd family foibles and dysfunctions. His words dance around these with feline agility.”

thinkinggardens.co.uk

“Stephen Anderton is a clever and witty writer and well known for his lively take on gardening”

Mary Keen, Daily Telegraph

“Stephen Anderton was invited by Christopher Lloyd to be his biographer, having been his friend for 20 years and being himself a distinguished gardening writer”

Peter Lewis, Daily Mail

“It may sound odd to say that a garden can move to tears, like music, like literature, but Great Dixter had that power”

David Sexton, Evening Standard

“Incisive... he is spot-on about Christopher: a maelstrom of talent and inhibition, conservatism and radicalism, rudeness and affection”

George Plumptre, Mail on Sunday

“I thoroughly enjoyed Stephen Anderton's biography... Few figures loomed larger in the world of 20th-Century gardening than 'Christo', and Mr Anderton has done an admirable job in discovering and revealing what made him the remarkable man he was... Anderton's style is so effortlessly easy and his subject such a fascination that I read the biography at one sitting”

Colin Hambridge, Birmingham Post

“A fascinating insight into the life of one of our greatest gardeners who was as colourful as his garden”

Theenduringgardener.com

“It is a gripper and quite an eye opener”

Daily Express, Alan Titchmarsh

“This book is extremely well-written, and the narrative fair bowls along.'; 'I would recommend this book to the many people who love both Dixter and Christopher's books, which together form this exceptional man's legacy.”

Ursula Buchan, The Oldie

“Stephen Anderton celebrates a hero of his own, and one of England's finest gardeners”

Megan Walsh, The Times, Christmas round up

“Excellent”

Guardian

“A touching biography of the great gardener "Christo" - his life, eccentricities and beloved garden”